system suitesparse is assumed to be dynamic

[6e441f9c]

As we know, SuiteSparse loves to build itself as static library.

Even more, when Julia build has to build SuiteSparse on its own, it builds static libraries and then combines shared libraries out of them.

Is there any drawback in allowing system SuiteSparse to be static? We have a static SuiteSparse, and while packaging Julia I just create a full SuiteSparse shared library and symlink it under all the relevant names.

Is Julia against using existing codepath for, say, USE_SYSTEM_STATIC_SUITESPARSE case?

[vtjnash]

I'm not sure what you are asking. There is a script in contrib that will attempt to build a shared library out of a static system SuiteSparse, which can be run in preparation for building Julia with USE_SYSTEM_SUITESPARSE=1 when the system SuiteSparse is a static library (as it often likes to be). This script is not executed by default during a normal build with USE_SYSTEM_SUITESPARSE=1 to avoid confusion (the use_system flags typically indicate that the code should do nothing).

[JeffBezanson]

Right now we don't use static libraries directly; external libraries must be dynamic. @vtjnash could you add something to the readme describing how to set up for USE_SYSTEM_SUITESPARSE?